Wedding Forum - What went wrong? (extra long post)...

So I got married last week and my partner and I had a fabulous wedding. We were lucky with the weather, the service was lovely, the meal was delicious and the dancing and drinking went on for three full days. BUT we had our hiccups, some more severe than others, and I'm hoping you all did too, otherwise I am the worst bride in history. Please use this thread to post what, if anything, went wrong at your weddings!

On the morning of MY wedding, I woke up on a mattress on the floor in my Dad's girlfriend's baby's bedroom, since we had messed up assigning accommodation and run out of beds. We were doing our own catering and had not got around to sorting out a vegetarian option or icing the cake, so instead of having a champagne breakfast I spent the morning making vegetarian shepherd's pie while my sisters made sugar roses.

I had planned to wear wellies for the service since it is winter and there is no path across the graveyard to our church, but on the morning I couldn't find them (my husband had them??) so I ended up wearing my heels anyway. I also had to get married without a veil, since it mysteriously disappeared and has not been seen since.

The photographer nearly brained himself on the low doorframe of the groomsmen's cottage, but fortunately he was prepared to carry on bravely. There was blood, but he didn't get any on the dress.

When I got in the car, I was hoping for a touching father daughter moment, but my Dad spent the whole trip talking to the driver about sports. He also made him pullover into the lane immediately before the church so my Dad could pee behind a bush.

We arrived at the church, and the minister asked if we had the marriage schedule. The marriage schedule is a document prepared by the registrar and is the Scottish equivalent of having the banns read. The minister MUST have it in his hand before the ceremony can legally begin. We had left it at home. The minister also enquired politely after several VIP guests that he had expected to arrive with the bridal party... we had completely forgotten to send somebody to collect them and bring them to church. Ceremony was delayed for 30 minutes while we dispatched parties to fetch the guests and hunt frantically for the marriage schedule.

The important bits of the service, the vows, went off perfectly, but there were a few other issues although I wasn't distracted by them: it was easy for me to concentrate since I left it too late to get contact lenses so I couldn't see any of the guests. I have no idea what music we walked in or out to - I didn't get around to choosing anything so the minister stuck on a CD of his own. The groom nearly walked out to no music... when the minister beckoned us forwards for the final prayers husband thought we were done and set off up the aisle by himself. We had picked witnesses - our mums - but we didn't actually tell them they had been picked, so there was a bit of confusion all round when it came to signing the register. When we eventually left the church, everyone realised they had forgotten to bring confetti. That was one photo opportunity missed, and we weren't sure about the other photos either since we hadn't organised anywhere in advance to have them taken, and we couldn't agree with family where we should go. We tried a few outside but it was freezing so we ended up doing them in a small side room at the reception venue.

My granny tripped over a step the day before the wedding and landed face first on the road outside her house, so she was sporting a massive black eye. She said it didn't hurt much though, and the photographer promised to photoshop it out of the pictures. I guess maybe he had extra sympathy after his own accident.

At least my granny was there for the pictures when she was wanted... it took more than two hours to take our list of about 15 formal group shots, because people kept wandering off in between photos even when specifically told not to leave the room. Groomsmen and grandparents were the worst... sometimes they would manage to leave in between shots even when they were wanted for two photos in a row. Also, even though we started taking the photos immediately after the service, my Grandad somehow had managed to change out of his suit and into an ancient sweater. He insisted on wearing the sweater for the photos, but happily my Granny was able to persuade him that his coyote fur Davy Crockett hat was not appropriate.

The meal went off without a hitch, at least none that affected me personally, the food was amazing and I ate as much as I could fit into the dress. One of the bridesmaids got drunk, my Dad missed the speeches because we sent him home to fetch the flowers we were going to present to our mothers, then my husband was too shy to do it anyway so I had to make up a speech on his behalf on the spot and I didn't even do the part with the flowers. A stray two year old fell off the stage during the speeches and hit his head, so there is a huge crash followed by wailing in the video.

The Grand March (a traditional bridal procession used locally to start the dancing) got a bit confused and ended in something of a tangle, possibly because there was a special needs teenager "helping" who may have sent couples in the wrong direction. Or some other reason. I don't know. After that the band was supposed to announce that we wanted the floor cleared for our special bridal waltz, but obviously they hadn't got that message because they went straight into the normal dance programme. I tried to get my Dad to go and sort them out but this time when I found him he was actually BEHIND the bar serving drinks. My uncle offered to go instead but he only heard half the message I gave my Dad, so the band got the wrong idea again and the next dance they called wasn't the right thing either. By this time I was frantic since we only had 15 minutes to do our special dance before the photographer had to leave, but we managed to get everything coordinated and get through it in the end. In the midst of the confusion someone (Maid of Honour, but she denies it!) stepped on my dress and ripped out the bustle stitches, but I was able to manage the waltz with the train hooked up over my arm.

I think that was more or less the last screw up on the actual wedding day. We left the reception at about 3am, and we were so exhausted after everything we slept in till 5pm the following day and ended up being late for the second night of the reception which started at 7pm. Because we had slept so late we stayed at the reception on the second night until about 6am, I heard later that one of the groomsmen didn't come in until noon. The reason I'm mentioning it is that it led to the situation on the third night, where I went home at 10pm by myself and husband/groomsmen didn't come in at all, meaning that none of the packing got done (since our suitcase was at his pre-wedding accommodation) and we had to leave at the last minute to catch the ferry, without a significant proportion of our things, including the marriage certificate. We arrived at the ferry just as it was pulling away, the crew were nice enough to come back for us otherwise I might be divorced by now. At the other end of the ferry trip we had to pay a fortune for train tickets since I hadn't been able to book a night in advance because husband didn't come in and had all of our bank cards.

Oh, plus we all caught rotten colds, so I am off work and husband is refusing to sleep in our bed since I keep him awake with my nose blowing.

This is obviously just a run down of the things that didn't work, most of the wedding was brilliant, we had an amazing time, all our friends had an amazing time, everyone has said how wonderful everything was etc etc. I was wondering though - was it the most disorganised wedding in history? Are all weddings a bit like this? Were the rest of you cutting out placecards at 1am on the morning of your wedding, or icing the cake two hours before the service? Was anyone's wedding a total disaster?

Let me know!

Wow, well you certainly have some memories and stories to share about your day LOL! i'm so glad that you've taken it in such good humour though - a lot of people wouldn't have.
Our wedding day itself was fine - nothing went wrong etc. But it was when we had the blessing back her ein London and our reception that we experienced some problems...
1. Got a call at 10am from my Godmother saying that she and mum couldn't get into the venue to decorate, despite the manager saying he'll be there from 9am so they could. no answer from their phone...all fixed on 20 mins when he returns with milk so he could make them all a cuppa LOL!
2. My BM calling me saying that she won't be able to make it to my flat to get her hair an make up done and she'll just meet us straight at the park. No explanation...(later find out that the zip broke on her dress and she had to make an emergency trip into town to get it replaced).
3. Said BM calls me at 3.30 (blessing starts at 4pm) saying they're stuck in traffic that's at a stand still about 5 miles away and they would be late. She arrives bang on 4pm though and is literally thrown out of the car by her partner then he goes off to park the car LOL!
4. Oh and I broke my toe two weeks before this, so I couldn't wear my shoes and had to wear trainers, which tbh, was FAR more comfortable and practicle for a park blessing anyway, so really didn't matter.
5. My sister made my cake and brought it 70 miles in the car. By the time it arrived one side of it was crooked. She had managed to do a bit of repair, but it was still a bit crooked. It didn't matter, it tasted AMAZING!

I think that's it. At the end of the day, it really doesn't matter if things go wrong. It happens. It just makes for memories and stories to tell x

awww crikey! wat a nightmare, am sorry hun! i think u needed a weddin planner!!!

Gosh hun that is an extensive list of mishaps, i'm sure all in all though you had a wonderful day. I am also sure that you are not the only one who had an eventful wedding. Hugs and get better soon. xx

i agree with madhen, and will admit i had a wee chuckle but in a few years time youll laugh about it all. as they say its the little things fantastic story!!!! and congrats again to you both xxx

I honestly don't think weddings run as smoothly as we'd like to believe. We got married last August at Gretna and we had our dramas as well.

1. We hired a car to drive up to Gretna the day before. The last stop before leaving Leeds was to collect my wedding dress from my parents (they'd already set off by rail). After letting myself into their house and getting the dress into the back of the car - I forgot to shut the door properly and just missed taking off the door when I set off and was just about to pass a parked car (that would've been an expensive weekend lol).
2. We planned for any event with the weather, even buying umbrellas to take with us. We arrived at Gretna and realised we'd forgot the umbrellas - and yep, it was raining the day of the wedding!! Luckily the venue must have been used to the weather and had umbrellas for us to use.
3. The ceremony went well - but when it came to us leaving the wedding room, I looked for my husband and he'd walked out first with his brother (best man) which left me walking behind them lol. He said afterwards that he hadn't given it a thought because he wasn't really sure what to do.
4. My bm's dress fitted perfectly, except for being just a minute bit too long (but not to the naked eye). By the time it came to the evening, in the hotel bar just after the reception, she started dancing and finished up putting her foot through her dress. She ripped all the bottom and I finished up taking her to one side and pinning it up with safety pins. She was in tears.
5. When we left Gretna the day after, with best man in tow - we got almost half way back to Leeds when he asked us 'what were you supposed to do with the marriage schedule? Did it need to be handed in?' Aargh - blind panic because it needed to be back at the registry office no later than 3 days after the wedding...so we had to turn the car around and drive all the way back to post it through the door of the registry office. That put another hour and a half on our journey - but at least it meant we were legally married lol.

Tattiesoup -- at least you'll have a memorable day to look back on lol. Congratulations!!!